Voices from the Field (2019-05-27)

Welcome back to Kaymakçı!

Voices from the Field has been “on leave” since the 2017 field season, but the Kaymakçı Archaeological Project team has not been idle! The project continues to move forward with a number of publications, discussing topics ranging from broad overviews of the site and its region to specific studies on materials from theexcavation and previousregionalsurvey.

We are excited to explore three different sectors of the site this year with continuing excavations. In area 95.555, Ebru Kaner (PhD candidate, Istanbul University) hopes to improve current understandings of the fortification system, including refining the date of its initial construction and later modifications. In area 97.541, Catherine Scott (PhD, Boston University) aims to investigate the earliest phases of a suite of building complexes in the Inner Citadel. In area 109.523, Dalila Alberghina (PhD candidate, Koç University) is continuing to explore the use of a suite of buildings in the middle of the Southern Terrace, with an additional goal of determining the depth and date of artificial fills that extend at least 3.5 m below the modern ground surface.

There are new developments in our off-site work, as well. We’ve recently moved from the temporary accommodations we’ve been privileged to make use of for the last several years to a new facility and have begun to re-inventory and reorganize five years of excavation materials. Long-term and painstaking work with ceramics, metals, small finds, mudbrick, sediment chemistry, plant remains, animal bones, and more is beginning to bear intellectually stimulating and interesting fruit, helping to situate Kaymakçı within broader understandings of second-millennium BCE western Anatolia. We are continuing to develop digital technologies for 3D recording on site and in the lab, also, with improvements to display and analysis coming soon.

More detailed posts on many of these topics are soon to appear, so we hope you’ll welcome the return of our “Voices” and follow along here and on our social media accounts!